Connected Conversations

We must stop SOPA and PIPA, two proposed pieces of legislation that would serious undermine our freedom of expression.

If these laws pass, essentially anyone would have the right to shut down my companies web site, www.tips.by, merely because it hosts shared content on an overseas web site. I am part of a tech community that is innovating and creating new jobs.

As a father of four children, I oppose this legislation that further criminalizes sharing. I am pro-sharing.

As a founder of e-thePeople, I think that sharing of information is the cornerstone of democracy. It’s called the first amendment, because it is the fundamental right that protects all others.

Sign Google’s petition here: https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/

Spread the word on Facebook & Twitter. Black out your profile image too before the government does.

1. technology, 2. politics, 3. et cetera Internet, Legalize sharing, Stop SOPA

I think Christopher Columbus day is really a celebration of discovery. I also believe that the goal of entrepreneurs is to discover a repeatable business. So, what can entrepreneurs learn from Christopher Columbus?

1. The most transformational ideas are crazy. I mean, reach the far east by going *west*?
2. The funding for most grand discoveries often comes from angels, who do so for commercial reasons principally
3. You will probably discover something different than what you originally set out to find (and it may take awhile before you figure out what it is that you’ve discovered!)
4. Even when you find something amazing, you won’t necessarily end up rich

Draw your own conclusions!

1. technology, 3. et cetera christopher columbus, discovery, entrepreneurs, lessons learned

I really liked this interview because Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh seem to care more about winning championships than personal glory. Here’s the interview:

Actually, it reminds me most about pickup ball in NYC. Pickup ball had a few key rules to determine who could play. First, winners stay on, losers leave. Second, one person had “next,” and was responsible for forming a team to play the winners. Third, anyone who wasn’t playing or included on a “next” team could become the leader of claim the next “next” team, and so on.

The interesting dynamic is that sometimes a good player would forgo the opportunity to play “next” because they preferred to sit out a little longer in order to play with their friends and form a really great team of their own choosing. In the long run, this strategy could lead to a winning streak that yielded more court time despite the longer wait to start.

In effect, Wade and Bosh have claimed “next.” And heaven help the other teams in the NBA if LeBron joins too!

3. et cetera i hope lebron goes to the knicks, nba, winning

Mark Suster (a former entrepreneur who is now a VC at GRP Partners) writes this post describing the background of his ideal candidate for his VC positon:

computer science undergrad from MIT (or any other great school), 2-years at McKinsey but no more than that (I love the analytical framework that the top strategy consulting firms provide. BCG, Bain, LEK – they’re all great), a few years at a start-up or a few years somewhere like Microsoft, Google, Amazon or Apple. MBA fine, but not required.

Compare that profile to my background: Computer science at Princeton, 3 years at Oliver Wyman (top strategy consultancy to the financial services), Fulcrum Analytics/E-thePeople.org (e.g., start ups), Ph.D. at Stanford. Looks pretty good, at least on paper, right? Right?!? :)

3. et cetera don't break your arm patting yourself on the back, me

Using YouTube, this one man has become the most watched educator in the world. His story is pretty neat, as is his pedagogical philosophy. Doesn’t hurt that he appears to be incredibly smart and curious. I plan to check out some of the instructional videos, and see if it would be good for my kids!

Enjoy!

1. technology, 3. et cetera education, hedge fund, inspiration, youtube

Break it down, fellas! Malcom Gladwell criticized my alum mater asking “Why are Hunter’s results so disappointing?” Hunter students have IQ scores three and a half standard deviations above the mean and are given the best classroom resources, so they are not as distinguished as they should be: “Although most of our study participants are successful and fairly content with their lives and accomplishments,” the authors conclude, “there are no superstars . . . and only one or two familiar names.” Thank you, Obama, for providing yet another piece of evidence against this unfair criticism.

First, I present to you, Elena Kagan, Obama’s pick for the Supreme Court. Is that a big enough superstar for you, Malcom?

Second, I present to you Young MC. Watch this video to be reminded how great he is. No gimmicks just hip hop. Bust a move!

Want to see more Hunter superstars? I rest my case!

2. politics, 3. et cetera Elena Kagan, gladwell, hchs, Hip hop, Obama, Supreme Court, Young MC

Facebook made some huge announcements yesterday.

At its core, Facebook’s unique capability is identity warranting, i.e., proving that a person is who she says she is. This proof comes in three ways. First, Facebook profiles have an enormous amount of personal information that is difficult to create without intimate knowledge of the person. Second, the network of friends interlinked provide social proof that the profile is indeed who she says she is. Third, Facebook has information about interactions among these real people. The most important of these interactions are group photos, which firmly establish individuals and who they associate with.

With this core in place, Facebook is now unveiling the scaffolding necessary for every site to be social. Imagine if you can always see who the real people who are visiting a site at the same time as you. Imagine if your newsfeed on Facebook contained the highlights of everything your friends are doing anywhere, online or offline. Within five years, these visions will be so real you will not remember what our current anonymous Internet looks like.

Many individuals and sites may want to resist. This change is scary, no doubt! But I see it as inevitable because the immediate benefits to individuals and sites far outweigh the immediate costs. It is unclear whether the longer-term risks are worth it or not, but the short-term economics are too powerful in my opinion to resist.

3. et cetera

Maria and I had the pleasure of seeing the debut of Debi Nova’s new solo act in NYC last night. Debi is a sister of our neighbor, which is why we were invited to the event, but more relevantly she backed up Ricki Martin and the Black Eyed Peas. I am posting two videos here, the first one professionally produced for MTV and the other one captured by me with my iphone on Thursday night night. Enjoy!

Live video captured on my iPhone - pretty nice quality!

3. et cetera

Here’s a great analysis of the iPad, by the former chief evangelist of Apple and famous VC, Guy Kawasaki:

“The first five million will be sold in a heartbeat,” said Guy Kawasaki, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who was a marketing executive at Apple in the 1980s. “But let’s see: you can’t make a phone call with it, you can’t take a picture with it, and you have to buy content that before now you were not willing to pay for. That seems tough to me.”

I find the argument completely persuasive.

Except that it ignores the Steve Jobs reality distortion field. His brilliance is turning everything on its head. People will love the content *more* because they have to pay for what was previously free. People will love it because it has *less* freedom than other computers. Perhaps people will particularly love it because it does *not* have a phone or camera.

Whether Kawasaki or Jobs is right, I am fascinated to watch how the iPad experiment unfolds.

3. et cetera

Haunting, new age, and especially appropriate for this blog. Enjoy!

1. technology, 3. et cetera video

Mark Suster wrote a provocative post about a common phrase in the entrepreneurial community called “Failing Fast.” He says:

Failing fast “is so self centered it winds me up. Tell that to the person who wrote you the $50,000 of their hard earned money and entrusted you to try your best. Fail fast? How does your brother-in-law feel about that?

Fail fast = quit and give up easy = spaghetti against the wall = no clear strategy going into your business = no ability / willingness to try and pivot as market conditions change = easy way out…”

First, his tirade smacks of hypocrisy. Does Mark re-up on all his portfolio companies when they are having trouble getting traction, or does he triage his portfolio and let the losers fail? No, each company in his VC portfolio is like strand of spaghetti and his strategy is to have one or two of them stick. Like all successful VCs, he plays the gorilla game and makes all of his profits by doubling down on a few winners and folding quickly on the losers.

Second, he misconstrues the point. His second paragraph is way off base. Failing fast = learning and pivoting. Think Odeo + Twitter. Were the initial investors of Odeo happy or unhappy that Jack Dorsey’s decision? Failing fast has nothing to do with abandoning your fiduciary duties to your investors. This is a serious and false accusation to make of entrepreneurs who talk about “failing fast.”

Third, I’ll admit that “failing fast” sounds bad. But that is on purpose, to be intentionally provocative. When we look at successful startups like Amazon, Google, Ebay, etc., their success looks obvious and easy. Revisionist history makes the rise to glory appear like smooth sailing. To combat this myth, “failing fast” focuses on the risks and, more importantly, the learning that startups and entrepreneurs must do. The unit of output for a startup is validated learning. You have a general theory, based on a set of hypotheses. You test them in order to reduce your risk as quickly possible, and pivot as necessary.

Mark’s idea about “fast” is wrong too. It isn’t about folding the company quickly; it’s about failing (and then pivoting) from smaller tests way before the whole thing is doomed.

Fundamentally, Mark misses the point. Of course, you can learn from success and that is preferred route. It is just very rare. Failures large and small are a reality, but the real question is how you deal with them. The real point is this: the opposite of success isn’t failure, it’s mediocrity.

So what do I tell “my brother-in-law who invested $50,000″? I share my hypotheses and the results of my experiments with him. And hopefully SocialFeet is more like a Twitter and not like an Odeo, but in either event, we’re along for the ride together.

1. technology, 3. et cetera

An incredible blend of technology, talent, and inspiration. Enjoy!

1. technology, 3. et cetera

Fred Wilson wrote an interesting list of 10 characteristics of great companies. My contribution was suggesting an 11th characteristic: “Great companies fail repeatedly - and learn from their mistakes. ” But even more importantly, check out this classic Michael Jordan ad that is the inspiration for that idea:

My transcription of it:

Michael Jordan talking: “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been entrusted to take the game winning shot, and missed. I’ve failed over and over again in my life my life. And that is why I succeed.”

Gives me tingles to watch it!

1. technology, 2. politics, 3. et cetera FAIL, Fred Wilson, great companies, Michael Jordan, top 10

I have a friend, Bobby Fishkin, who has started a neat startup called ReFrameIt. It is a Firefox plugin that allows you to create and share annotations on the web pages you visit. Over the past year, he has made very nice technical progress on his service, and has formed a heavy-weight advisory board including such Internet luminaries as Terry Winograd, Esther Dyson and Larry Lessig.

So, imagine Bobby’s surprise when he learned that Miracle Whip was launching a competitive social annotation service called Zingr! My question: did his illustrious board see this coming and how should he respond?! Does he need to take the battle to Miracle Whip’s home turf, perhaps a hip new product like RefraMayo?

Of course, the real story is that this service was created by an ad agency. Mayonnaise isn’t a real threat, but perhaps Bobby should start talking to other agencies about partnerships if there really is interest in these marketing initiatives.

3. et cetera